security

Ugh.

After hundreds of private nude photographs were stolen from celebrities' phones and then posted to the Internet without any of their consent, many theorized that this security breach pointed out a huge flaw in cloud-based storage systems like Apple's iCloud. Today Apple acknowledged that while these celebrity accounts had been accessed through them, their iCloud system was not technically breached in any way.

Call Zero Cool on these chumps.

Community Health Systems is a network of 206 hospitals in 29 states, and today they've announced they were hacked. The hackers, working out of China, managed to get 4.5 million patient records including names, social security numbers, and addresses. CHS is now working with the FBI to identify and arrest the thieves.

Weird this Jar Jar mask has zero bids.

Good Bad news, everyone! eBay was hacked, and they're saying passwords have been compromised. According to the company there's nothing that indicates any financial information has been compromised, but it's best to be safe and update your account before you end up paying for someone's limited edition Jem and the Holograms figurines.

For sale: baby monitor, very haunted.

Being a parent is terrifying enough without some jag-off hacking into your baby monitor and wreaking Paranormal Activity-type havoc, but that's exactly what happened recently to the Schreck family of Ohio--and they're not the first to be affected by a little-known security flaw in Foscam's IP cameras.

They can store your personal information, but it doesn't mean they do.

As I learned on a family vacation this weekend, some people think that their hotel keycard is encoded with all sorts of personal information. This belief leads to people refusing to turn in their keycards at the end of a hotel stay for fear of that information being stolen. It's not true, but here's why some people think it is.

After spending a month living in the Sheremetyevo Airport in Moscow, we'll bet pretty much anywhere that's not an airport concourse looks pretty good right now.

According to Reuters, NSA leaker Edward Snowden has finally been granted travel papers that would let him leave the transit area of Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport, where he has spent the last few weeks working to find his way to one of several nation's that has granted him asylum. Exactly where Snowden is heading now is still up in the air, but sources have indicated to Russian news site RT that Snowden is getting a fresh set of clothes and preparing to leave the airport shortly.

Every move you make, every step you take...well, you know the rest.

At a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier today, FBI Director Robert Mueller said that the agency uses unmanned drones to conduct surveillance in the United States. The admission came in response to questioning from Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA). According to Mueller, drones are used by the FBI to carry out domestic surveillance missions "in a very, very minimal way, and seldom.”

Yesterday, when it became clear that the National Security Agency was once again gathering the phone records of millions of American citizens without warrants or cause, it seemed like...oh, let's be politic and call it "an overstep." Turns out, we didn't even know what an overstep was, as it has now become clear that the NSA's phone record gathering program is far from the only questionable activity the NSA has its fingers in. Take for example the PRISM program, which collects data on Internet users -- including emails, file transfer records, and voice and video chats -- by tapping directly into the servers of Internet companies like Google, Microsoft and Facebook, just to name a few.

Considering the wide variety of products spam email acts as a barker for, you might assume that there are an equally diverse range of individuals, or at least programs, trying to sell you important goods like mirrors, plastic sheers, and of course medications for male stamina. (Also, wow, am I ever troubled by what my spam folder seems to think of me.) According to a recent look at the numbers, though, that's not the case. In fact, the study from the University of Twente suggests that just 20 of the more than 42,000 Internet service providers worldwide are responsible for nearly half of the emails that you get looking to sell you penis enlargement pills and various other high quality goods and services.